South African middleweight boxing champion Julie Shabalala sits on a bench in the Hillbrow Boxing Club and stares at her ragged training shoes.
“I am a champion,” she says, laughing with tears in her eyes, “and I have holes in my shoes.”
Although there are just 21 professional women boxers in South Africa, they include two world champions, Noni Tenge and Unathi Myekeni, and two South African champions, Shabalala and Ester Mashiya. It sounds impressive, but the reality is that women’s boxing in South Africa is on the ropes.
The biggest problem is a lack of competition. Shabalala hasn’t had a fight for months, even though she made the transition from junior middleweight to middleweight in a bid to find opponents. Even Myekeni, who is the World Boxing Federation international junior featherweight champion, has not had a fight this year. But she is the only woman fighter in South Africa who has a sponsor.
“It has to do with the social obligations of companies,” Loyiso Mtya, a former South African boxing champion, said. According to Mtya, who is acting chief executive of Boxing South Africa, sponsors are wary of supporting the sport because it is perceived to be “too violent”.
Women’s boxing was legalised in South Africa in 2001 and its heartland is the Eastern Cape. Mtya attributes this to the support of the Eastern Cape provincial government, which recognises that “boxing is part of the culture”. He said the sport is also growing in KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo.
The rules of women’s boxing are not very different from those of the men’s. Men fight for three minutes a round, for up to 12 rounds. Women’s fights last a maximum of 10 rounds, each taking only two minutes.
Dr Jon Patricios, a Johannesburg-based sports physician, said that women fighters were more vulnerable to injury than their male counterparts because women had smaller necks relative to the size of their skulls. “This causes greater acceleration-deceleration forces on the brain, with greater potential for concussion and blood vessel injury,” he said.
Female boxers also have to diet drastically so that they can qualify for certain weight divisions. Patricios said that can alter their menstrual patterns and even lead to decreased bone density.
Nick Durandt, the renowned trainer, manages Myekeni. He pulls no punches when asked how he feels about women fighters. “I like women very much,” he said, “but I don’t believe the good man upstairs made them to be hit in their faces.”
Durandt is adamant that “women can’t fight like men” because they “don’t have the finesse that men have”. He said he agreed to manage Myekeni only because he had trained her brother. “I don’t see Unathi as a woman in the ring. I see a fighter.”
For Durandt, boxing is first and foremost a business, not a sport. And this is another reason why women are losing out. “Unathi doesn’t sell 10 000 tickets,” Durant said. “If I were a banker, she would be a bad investment.
“I don’t make money out of her. I do it because I like her,” he said.
The lack of financial pull has a knock-on effect for the women. According to Durandt, a male boxer can earn R70 000 for a bout but a female fighter would consider herself lucky to get R20 000.
Most women’s boxing bouts take place in August to coincide with Women’s Month. This August East London will host a special tournament called “The Girls are Doing It”, during which Shabalala will defend her title. Myekeni will feature on the bill. It will be the first time in a year that she’s had a chance to fight.
The lack of female opponents means that both Myekeni and Shabalala have to spar against male boxers and they say the men certainly don’t hold back. “They hit me hard,” Shabalala, said with a laugh, “but it is good. It makes me strong. I don’t feel pain anymore.”